


Myr

by crossingwinter



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-11
Updated: 2014-06-11
Packaged: 2018-02-04 05:19:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1766956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crossingwinter/pseuds/crossingwinter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She doesn’t smile anymore.  Not because she doesn’t want to—oh no. She does.  Seeing people walk right by her without knowing who she is, noses buried in cell phones or ears plugged into music players—it’s all one big joke to her.  But because she doesn’t like the way she looks when she smiles.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Myr

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SapphireBlueJiyuu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SapphireBlueJiyuu/gifts).



She doesn’t smile anymore.  Not because she doesn’t want to—oh no. She does.  Seeing people walk right by her without knowing who she is, noses buried in cell phones or ears plugged into music players—it’s all one big joke to her.  But because she doesn’t like the way she looks when she smiles.  It can only ever be a half smile, you see, and Myrcella wants to smile with her soul.  She wants to smile with her whole face, but the scar on her cheek won’t let her, so she just…doesn’t. 

She thinks he understands that.  That when she doesn’t smile, it’s not because she doesn’t love him, and not even because she doesn’t _like_ him.  But rather because simply that she doesn’t smile at anything anymore.

She doesn’t mind wearing one earring in her remaining ear, doesn’t mind wearing her hair back so that everyone can see the scar. (She remembers Shireen and how beautiful she looked when she dared people to stare at it, as if saying _This is me and I am not it. But don’t pretend it’s not there—don’t you dare.)_   But smiling doesn’t feel right.  And, since it’s been so long since she smiled, she wonders if she mightn’t have forgotten _how_.

-

She knows he would want her dead if he knew who she was.  She knows that he is, and was, and always will be a Stark, and that he wants revenge for his father. She knows that it’s the scar on her face that prevents him from recognizing her for who she is, because Myrcella Baratheon is beautiful, golden, perfect, and Cella isn’t. Cella’s broken, her hair is matted, she’s good—too good, almost—with a gun, because how else was she supposed to have gotten out of Dorne where they were playing Ibbenese Roulette with her life. 

She likes that he can’t recognize her, that he doesn’t see her as that little girl in the green party dress who blushed whenever she looked at him and couldn’t say a word, because that little girl died with Arys when Cella’s ear was cut off.  Better not ruin that harmless impression.  Because if he knew that Myrcella Baratheon was as good with a rifle as any of his men, he’d probably have her shot on principle.

-

They both want it.  He thinks that she wants it to erase her criminal record; she knows he wants it to get rid of himself, so that his brother Bran can rule the North without any fear of anything.  He can add in a note—one single note—that Robb Stark died—and then head away to Myr or Lys or wherever strikes his fancy, free as a bird, knowing that his failures won’t haunt his brother.

That’s what he fears.  She sees it in his eyes.  That the King will see Bran and think he’s Robb’s puppet.

It’s funny—that’s what she wants too. _Myrcella Baratheon.  24. Killed in the Red Mountains._ Five words.  That’s all she needs.  Five little words in a digital file and then Myrcella’s as dead as Cella thinks she is.

-

He strikes a tragic figure, she thinks, staring broodily into the fire after Dacey and Smalljon and Wendel have gone to sleep. His face is illuminated, golden, and his eyes and all their blue look like the fire just leapt up onto his face.

 _Why is his tragedy greater than mine?  He’s not the only one who’s lost family_.

-

She knows he doesn’t trust her.  She doesn’t mind that though.  It’s smart, really.  Why should he trust her?  Trusting her would be remarkably stupid because she’s clearly too good at killing and clearly too perfect to be true, and he should have learned at the Twins that you never assume that something is perfect.

She doesn’t assume that he’s perfect. Myrcella Baratheon did that, not Cella Sand.  Cella Sand likes the figure he strikes while they walk, notices the way his muscles strain as they ford streams, likes the scars on his face and chest because it shows that he’s been hurt by all this—the madness of civil war, of everything falling to pieces in your hand—too.  Myrcella Baratheon might have liked that too, but not as much as Cella Sand.

-

He asks her about her family one night. It’s easy to lie about her father, because her father was a lie.  It’s easy to omit Joffrey, and Tommen, because they weren’t with her in Dorne.

But she can’t lie about her mother.

She has a ring with her mother’s face painted on it. It’s too much a likeness of Cersei Lannister to show Robb, and she wears it on a chain around her neck, tucked between her breasts, next to her heart.

If she’s lucky—if she’s very lucky—she’ll be as brave and proud as her mother.

If she’s unlucky—if she’s very unlucky—it’ll be her undoing too.

-

Her mother, uncle, and brother had been lined up and shot on King Stannis’ orders.

Stannis had been her uncle once—had been Myrcella’s uncle—and she had played with his daughter when they had been little.

She did not doubt for a second that if she and Robb were caught he’d line them up together and shoot them in front of the whole capital. 

- 

It doesn’t surprise her that Robb is caught. Not at all.  His plan was foolish.  Robb’s no fool, but that doesn’t mean his plans aren’t foolish. 

So she grits her teeth and goes in after him, sneaking by starlight through hallways she’d run through as a child. She shoots the guards in cold blood.  Myrcella would have cried, but Myrcella is dead.  She busts Robb and Dacey out and together, the three of them hack the system, change the words because it’s so easy—too easy—to overwrite a file, change their status to terminated.

She’s surprised when they don’t look on as she changes her own file.  Surprised because she’d think they’d be curious.  But they don’t look—maybe because she has just saved their lives or maybe because they trust her, or maybe because they know. 

-

 

Myr is a beautiful city, and Cella decides that it is right.  Cella in Myr—Myr for Cella. Too perfect.

Robb is curled up in bed.  He’s kicked the sheets away and is completely naked, but it’s warm and it doesn’t matter if he’s covered.  She thinks about going over to him, curling up next to him, whispering that she’s loved him since she was a girl—but she doesn’t.

Myrcella isn’t there anymore. There’s just Cella, and maybe Robb Snow will love Cella Sand, but she won’t let Robb Stark love Myrcella Baratheon.  Time moves on, people grow and change, and the past is as gone as footsteps in the Dornish


End file.
